


Like the Flowers Love the Sun

by xxdrarryrebellexx



Category: Kingdom Hearts (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, And I Love That For Him, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Flowers, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Hanahaki Disease, Kinda?, M/M, Poetic but not Overtly So, Riku In Love (Kingdom Hearts), Riku Loves Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Self-Indulgent, Sora Is a Ray of Sunshine (Kingdom Hearts), There's A Tag For That
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-20
Updated: 2020-07-20
Packaged: 2021-03-05 03:28:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,044
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25407652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xxdrarryrebellexx/pseuds/xxdrarryrebellexx
Summary: When Riku was little, he felt like maybe he didn’t really exist until Sora showed up.Now that Riku’s 18 he's gotten used to the bloody flowers bursting from his lungs. Loving Sora was as easy as breathing and he wonders if that's why it started to hurt so much. He doesn’t know when it started, but he knows how it will end. He’ll be found dead in his room with lungs full of hibiscus flowers and that’ll be it. He tries not to let it get to him too much because he still has Soranow. As a friend at least, his best friend, and he wouldn’t want anything about that to change.
Relationships: Riku & Sora (Kingdom Hearts), Riku/Sora (Kingdom Hearts)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 87





	Like the Flowers Love the Sun

**Author's Note:**

> shoutout to a certain Server Aunty who isn't even in this fandom, but beta'd this for me and helped me come up with a title because I couldn't figure out _anything_ and she helped me so much.
> 
> i love this fandom so much and this is my first fic in this fandom so i hope i was able to do it justice

When Riku was little, he felt like maybe he didn’t really exist until Sora showed up. His mom has pictures of them sharing cake at his 3rd birthday and Sora’s mom has pictures of them bathing together when they were a little older than that. 

When Riku was 6 and Sora was 5 and they were the only kids who’d ever stayed on the play island, Riku was in love. It was messy the way kids are. He hadn't called it love, hadn’t even known what love really was back then, but he’d told Sora that they'd always be together and that would have been enough for him.

Then Kairi showed up.

When Riku turned 16, Sora was still 15 and in love with Kairi. Riku had spent years learning to understand his feelings especially when puberty first hit and he wasn't interested in any of the girls at school. When he thought Sora was the prettiest person he'd ever met. When he thought Sora was a sunflower

Now that Riku’s 18 he's gotten used to the bloody flowers bursting from his lungs. Loving Sora was as easy as breathing. He wonders if that's why it started to hurt so much. He doesn’t know when it started, but he knows how it will end. He’ll be found dead in his room with lungs full of hibiscus flowers and that’ll be the end for him. He tries not to let it get to him too much because he still has Sora now. As a friend at least, his  _ best  _ friend, and he wouldn’t want anything about that to change.

“Riku!” Sora calls happily as he skates down the lane before gripping onto a strap on the taller boy’s book bag.

“Hey, Sora,” Riku responds softly, but he never stops moving. His foot kicks off the ground a little harder now that he’s got Sora and they head up the hill towards the high school. Riku wasn’t an excellent skateboarder by any means. He couldn’t do tricks like either of Sora’s brothers, but it was enough to get them both to school in one piece and had been for the last few years. When he takes a turn too sharply and Sora brushes against his shoulder, it’s almost like he can feel the petals fluttering around in his chest.

“Did you do the homework for Mr. Vexen’s class?”

“Did  _ you _ ?”

“Uh...most of it.”

“I’ll help you in first block,” Riku says but it doesn't come out as relaxed as he wishes it would. Sora doesn't seem to mind as he cheers and skates ahead so that Riku can see him twirl on his wheels happily.

“Thanks, Riku! You're the best!”

Riku knows he should leave it at that, just laugh and change the subject, but he doesn't. He picks at the scab on his heart, lets the flowers rattle in his lungs.

“Better than Kairi?” There's a teasing smirk on his face but he isn't joking in the slightest.

“Of course you are,” Sora says without missing a beat then he freezes, they both do. “I...I just mean you and Kairi are both my friends f-for different reasons and you're both the best at  _ that _ .”

Riku can see the blush blooming onto Sora’s face before the younger boy turns away to hide it and something about that calms the flowers blooming in his chest. He burps out a single white petal and watches as it floats through the air, the wind nuzzling it against Sora's cheek before it flies off into the grassier portions of the island.

“You're my best friend too, Sora,” Riku says, his voice quiet. Sora hears him anyway, he always does, and sends him a sunshine smile.

* * *

Riku’s chest hurts.

It's a thumping pain. An I-broke-two-ribs-falling-out-of-a-tree-with-Sora kind of pain. And he’d know, he's broken two ribs falling out of a tree with Sora before.

Riku is a year ahead of Sora, so he only gets to see him during lunch or electives. It's not ideal, but he sets it aside as the highlights of his day after coming to school together. When he walks into the cafeteria though, he freezes. Sora is there, of course, a plate full of food, a twinkle in his eye, and a smile on his face. But his smile isn't directed at Riku this time, it's on Kairi. Big and bright and blinding and bracketed by braces, but not for him.

His heart stalls and his chest  _ hurts _ and he runs off to the bathroom before anyone else can see the petals spewing from his lips.

He doesn't own Sora. Doesn't have a monopoly on his time or his attention or his  _ smile _ for fucks sake, but he wishes he did somehow. Wishes Sora kept a secret smile locked away only for Riku. Something loving and cared for.

There is no one in the bathroom when Riku flushes the petals down the toilet and pushes open the stall door, emerging somewhat shamefully. His chest still hurts, but there's less pressure even if it takes a herculean effort to breathe. He washes his hands and looks in the mirror to practice his smile. He doesn't want it to look like a grimace though somehow he knows it will anyway. His hands grip the sides of the sink so hard his knuckles have gone white.

“If Sora’s happy,” he says to himself, “I’m happy.”

When he smiles the next time he almost believes it.

* * *

Kairi kissed Sora.

Riku wants to kick and scream and throw a fucking tantrum, but mostly he just wants to cry, because he can feel his heart breaking. He can feel the flowers spinning in his lungs like a tornado, the vines and leaves squeezing tighter and tighter until his vision is going black and he  _ can't breathe. _

“Riku!” And that's Sora's voice and he’d do anything for Sora to be happy. He feels himself smiling or failing to, he can't be sure, but Sora is at his side.

Then he sees Kairi again and he's screaming or puking, but it feels like his mouth is stretching wider than physically possible yet he still can't get enough air.

Riku can feel the petals in his mouth and on his face and dripping between his fingers, but he can't stop them. They burst out of him like a fire hydrant being let out on a hot summer day.

The darkness sucks him in and swallows him up even as the petals keep spewing out of him.

* * *

Sora is a sunflower.

* * *

_ “Riku. Can you hear me?” _

* * *

Riku has to remind himself of that while he floats in an endless darkness. The bright beauty of him. His bluebell eyes and sun-kissed skin. His bandaged knees and bracketed teeth.

* * *

_ “R _

_ i _

_ k _

_ u” _

* * *

Sora is a sunflower, Riku reminds himself over and over again.

Beautiful, but deadly. He pulls him in with his smile and his laugh and his tight hugs, but his roots wrap just as tightly around his heart with his friendship and kindness; his stem poisons him with support and reassurance; only for his petals to crowd within his lungs and cradle his corpse softly.

* * *

_ “Riku, please.” _

* * *

Riku thinks that maybe he's always known how he'd die. That it’d be for Sora somehow. That he has always only been living for Sora.

Sora is a sunflower and he's been ensnared by his beauty.

* * *

_ “—ke up, Riku. Please. I...you have to know I feel the same way. I've always...Well, maybe not always but— I'm messing this up, aren't I...I just— I never thought I'd have to tell you like this. I thought you knew.” _

* * *

Sora is…

The darkness clears away at the feeling of chapped lips against his. There's spiky hair poking into him everywhere.

Sora is  _ here _ .

Riku sucks in a breath on instinct as he opens his eyes.

“Sora?”

“Riku…” Sora’s face is soft but worried above him, tear tracks still on his face. “You're safe, Riku!”

Riku braces himself against the bed in the nurse's office, where they seem to be, as Sora throws himself against him in his best semblance of a hug. He lifts a hand slowly and lays it across Sora's back gripping at the fabric there.

“I— we— Sora?”

“You're okay,” says Sora emphatically but Riku hasn't quite put together what’s happened yet.

“Of course I'm okay,” Riku says, pulling away to look at Sora directly. “Are you okay? Why are we in the nurse's office?”

“Why’re we— Riku! You almost died!”

“I… almost…” Looking down at himself Riku just notices the splotches of blood and mucky petals surrounding them like a murderous bed of flowers. He freezes and reels away from Sora, arms in the air like he's done something wrong. Because he  _ has.  _ In the heat of Sora's embrace, he’s forgotten that he's not allowed even that much anymore because it means he’ll want more. He waits for the flowers to burst from him again and put him out of his misery, but the tickle of a cough never happens. He sucks in a breath and doesn't feel the rattling of vines in his lungs. Then he remembers the  _ almost.  _ He’d  _ almost _ died, Sora had said.

“Riku are you o—”

“ _Sora,_ ” Riku says before he runs his tongue across his lips. As if he can taste Sora on them. Because Sora kissed him. Because Sora loved him. _Loves_ him. The blush on his best friend's cheeks is enough to warm everything in him.

“And you say  _ I'm _ oblivious,” says Sora smiling that bright smile. The one that Riku loves. The one that shows how much Sora loves him. It falls minutely as Sora rubs at the back of his neck. “I’m not really good with words and you know that so I just… I thought that us being with each other was enough. You’d get this little smirk on your face sometimes and I thought that maybe you just  _ knew _ . I mean, you're Riku, you know everything.”

“Not everything.”

“But I thought you did!” Sora insists. “So I'm not going to just assume anymore, okay?”

“O-okay.”

“Riku, I love you.” Sora is looking back into Riku’s eyes when he says it, his smile soft and loving and still every bit as blinding as usual. Riku melts at the warmth of this boy. The declaration feels like a dream he doesn't want to end. A tape he wants to put on an endless loop. A tattoo he wants to be etched into his skin like the tribal ones his Dad used to have. A song he wants to be beaten into the drum of his already booming heart.

This love feels as soft and fragile and beautiful as the petals that once inhabited his lungs. 

“I've always loved you, Sora,” he utters, his eyes wide in awe as he stares up into those baby blues, and it's the truest thing he’s ever said.

* * *

When Riku was little, he didn’t exist until he met Sora. Their moms have pictures of them being potty trained and learning to swim together and lying over one another, falling asleep on Sora's couch.

When Riku was 6, he and Sora were the only kids who’d ever stayed on the play island and Riku fell in love underneath a meteor shower. He hadn't called it love, but he’d told Sora that they'd always be together (Kairi too).

When Riku turned 16, he thought Sora was a sunflower.

Now that Riku’s 18, loving Sora is as easy as breathing. Has always been. Especially when he looks back at him on their ride to school, their hands clasped together and Sora's bright smile emboldened by braces. When the sun shines on him and the trinket Riku had given him under a meteor shower (now chained around his neck) glistens in the morning glow.

“Hey, Riku,” Sora says, “I love you.”

A breeze blows petals fro m the trees and Riku watches as they float in the air, billowing around Sora, a few getting caught in his spiky brown hair.

“I love you too,” says Riku, his voice a whisper beneath the sound of their wheels on dirt and asphalt. Sora hears him, as he always does, and sends him that sunflower smile.


End file.
